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Meditation for Veterans

Meditation: Why Do So Many Veterans Swear By it?

Meditation is helping thousands of Australian veterans lead an easier and calmer life by equipping them with the skills for things like better controlling their anger and any depressive thoughts, improving their empathy and understanding, managing sudden flashbacks or negatively reliving the past. It is also helping veterans to build stronger relationships with others, prevent relapses – and even helps them to improve a range of important and limiting mental health conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression

While the idea of meditation may be initially met with hesitation due to a stereotyped image of a person on a yoga mat with their legs crossed and eyes closed, meditation doesn’t need to be bound by a place, position, or even a specific length of time. Instead, it aims to help a person focus their mind, bring it back to the present moment, to help cultivate general physical and mental well-being, as well as working on specific skills such as concentration, compassion or insight.

So why are so many veterans here in Australia and worldwide swearing by meditation, what does meditation really look like, and how can you access fully-funded DVA meditation training that is uniquely designed for your life, challenges and goals, taught by a qualified psychologist? Here’s the low-down on meditation for your mental health.

What Is Mediation?

Meditation is a skill that helps you gain awareness and perspective into your thoughts and feelings and why they arise, without judgement, so you can better understand and manage them. Meditation comes hand-in-hand with mindfulness, which describes the ability to be fully present, aware of where you are and what you’re doing in the moment, staying fully engaged without being overwhelmed or reactive to what’s unfolding around you. 

Meditation is a proven, powerful strategy with a growing body of evidence for its benefits to veterans. The physical health benefits of meditation include:

  • Lower heart rate
  • Lower blood pressure
  • Lower blood sugar and cholesterol levels
  • Better digestion
  • Less muscle tension
  • Better sleep
  • Stronger immune system

While the physical health benefits are impressive, it’s the mental health benefits that are often accredited to transforming lives – particularly in the areas of post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, among many others.

Meditation For PTSD

PTSD can occur in anyone who has experienced or witnessed a traumatic event – and for veterans, there are often many that arise from their time in service. The result is feelings of anxiety, anger, avoidance, unwanted memories or nightmares, heightened reactions and more, long after the event has passed.

Meditation has continuously shown in studies to lessen the symptoms of PTSD while maintaining a high satisfaction rate among vets within the meditation program. It also achieves this without causing veterans to relive their trauma. It doesn’t take long to reap the benefits, either. As little as 90 minutes of meditation per week – or less than 15 minutes per day, was shown to lessen the symptoms of PTSD in veterans more effectively than a program involving psychoeducation, relaxation and sleep hygiene.

Meditation For Depression

The military environment can act as a catalyst for the development and progression of depression. Being separated from support systems and loved ones, the stressors faced in combat, and seeing themselves and others in harm’s way have all been found to increase the risk of depression in veterans. 

Meditation has been shown to reduce the symptoms of depression, while improving mindfulness and a veteran’s quality of life. Significant results for depression have been found in as little as 12 weeks, and improvements in both depression and PTSD are closely linked. 

What Does Meditation Look Like?

After gaining much popularity worldwide with an estimated 200 – 500 million people practising meditation, it is now a central component of mind-body medicine and used as part of a care for people of a range of ages, locations and abilities. 

In Australia, what a veteran’s unique meditation plan looks like depends on the challenges they are facing and what is deemed best by their DVA-funded psychologist. This may incorporate one or more of four primary types of mediation:

  • Compassion meditation: meditation that repeats certain phrases that are designed to enhance empathy and a sense of connection to other people, as well as compassion for themselves and others, empathy. This may benefit veterans who have challenges establishing emotional connections with others or socialising. 
  • Transcendental meditation (TM): medication that involves silently repeating a mantra given by their TM practitioner. This is typically in the form of a specific sound, word or short phrase, and is done silently in a person’s mind for a set time.
  • Mantra meditation – meditation that uses a simple and meaningful mantra to redirect the energy that may be otherwise spent on negative thinking. This can be done any time, any place and for any amount of time, making it a good choice for veterans who don’t care to quietly sit and meditate each day.
  • Mindfulness meditation – meditation that encourages veterans to be aware and mindful of the present moment, allowing thoughts to come and go without any judgement or reactions, with a particular emphasis on deep breathing.

Aside from reducing symptoms of mental health conditions or physical health problems, meditation and the training completed with your psychologist can also help in areas like learning to live with intention and set priorities, slowing the body and mind in order to relax instead of feeling overwhelmed, effectively focusing on one thing at a time to help reduce feelings of stress, recognising and interrupting a stress or anger response like road rage, and much more.

Fully-Funded Meditation And Psychology Services With DVA

If you’re feeling depressed, anxious, suffering from PTSD or struggle managing the challenges, thoughts and emotions that daily life brings, now is the best time to talk to a DVA-funded psychologist. Making an appointment opens the door to discussing your concerns and seeing if meditation could be right for you – and if not, if they can still help with the wide range of other tools and services they offer to help you overcome your challenges. You only need to have served one day in the Australian Defence Force, including reservists, to access these services.

Accessing a psychologist under DVA starts with an appointment to see your GP or medical specialist. During this visit they will perform a comprehensive veteran health check and then provide a referral to the psychologist. You can then make a booking with a psychologist that offers DVA-funded care on your own – or get connected to our trusted network of psychologists through Veteran Benefits Australia at no cost to you. This ensures that you get connected to the best provider given your unique circumstances, goals and concerns, and someone that we know has extensive experience with understanding and working with veterans like yourself.

Join Thousands Of Australian Veterans Today

Many Australian veterans know they need more help with their health or to access a service, but aren’t sure where to start, and so put off the process. Here at Veteran Benefits Australia, we are dedicated to connecting Australian veterans to the full range services they are entitled to and can benefit from, so they don’t miss out from not being familiar with how the system works, or not having all the right information about their entitlements.

Our team provides a fully-funded service to support you in making sure you have access to the very best services available. To get started, fill in the contact form below. 

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You are not obligated to provide us with your personal information. You may choose whether you receive communications from us. Whilst it is your choice not to provide your personal information to us this may impede our ability to provide you with all of the functionality of our Veteran Benefits Australia Services.

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We will deal with all requests for access to personal information as quickly as possible, but no later than 30 calendar days from the date of your request (unless any complexities arise).

We will refuse access where the personal information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings, and the information would not be accessible by the process of discovery in those proceedings. Further, we will refuse access where your request is frivolous or vexatious, and where we reasonably believe that: giving access would pose a serious threat to the life, health or safety of any individual, or to public health or public safety; unlawful activity, or misconduct of a serious nature, is being or may be engaged in against Veteran Benefits Australia and giving access would be likely to prejudice the taking of appropriate action in relation to that matter.

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These are the terms and conditions of Veteran Benefits Australia. All advices, referrals and other services provided by Veteran Benefits Australia (“Services”) whether via its website at www.veteranbenefitsaustralia.com (“Website”) or by contacting Veteran Benefits Australia in any other manner, are provided on these Terms & Conditions and all customers of Veteran Benefits Australia’s Services (each a “Customer”) agree to these Terms & Conditions as a pre-condition of obtaining any Services from Veteran Benefits Australia. No terms and conditions introduced by the Customer shall take effect to vary these Terms & Conditions unless expressly agreed in writing by Veteran Benefits Australia.

About Veteran Benefits Australia’s Services

Veteran Benefits Australia’s Services are an online service and information blog designed to connect Customers to third party service providers (“Service Providers”) to facilitate Customers’ awareness and access to possible useful services for veterans, whether at full or discounted prices, as described in the various service categories described on the Website.

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Whilst all care is taken to connect Customers with suitable, qualified and appropriate Service Providers based on the Customer’s instructions as to their needs, Veteran Benefits Australia does not endorse the advices of any Service Provider and expressly disclaims any liability for any products and services provided by Service Providers. Customers are encouraged to consider if the products and services of the Service Provider are suitable for the Customer’s needs and seek independent advice if required.

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Part A

Social Worker Services

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Part B

Management of Health and Medical Information

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Viewing Your Accepted Conditions

The following steps will help view the accepted conditions of your DVA white card via the MyGov website.

Step 1:

Go to https://my.gov.au

Sign in to your myGov account using your Username and Password.

You can sign in to myGov using the following:

  • Your username (Your myGov username has 2 letters and 6 numbers. For example XY123456)
  • Your email address used to create your account
  • Your mobile number (if you have enabled this option)

After entering your login details you may be required to provide a one-time access code.

  • A one-time use code is sent by SMS to your mobile phone.

If you do not have a myGov account, you can create one by selecting Create myGov account on the myGov sign-in page.

Sign-in using the MyGov login page

Step 2:

Once you have logged into your account scroll down until you see the heading ‘Your Services’.

Your Services lists the government programs you access that offer online services through myGov. You should see ‘Department of Veteran Affairs’ listed here.

Select ‘Department of Veteran Affairs’.

If you do not see Department of Veteran Affairs listed you will have to link this service to your account (See the video below).

You can do this by selecting Link another service.

Select the DVA tile

Step 3:

This is your Department of Veterans’ Affairs My Service Home Page.

My Service allows you to access DVA services online such as:

  • Access support for a service-related condition or injury
  • Access your digital DVA Veteran Card
  • Lodge and track the status of your claims

Look in the middle column titled Claims.

Select Accepted Conditions.

Select Accepted Conditions from the Claims Menu

Step 4:

This page shows your digital DVA Veteran Card.

You will see information such as your Card NumberExpiryCard Type and the Conditions listed on your card.

Select the Conditions Listed drop-down menu to view the conditions listed on your card.

Step 5:

Select Print this Page in the top right-hand corner of the page to download your digital DVA Card as a PDF.

Alternatively, if accessing this on your mobile phone you can take a screenshot of this page. Depending on your phone you can:

  • Press the Side button and the Volume up button at the same time (iPhone)
  • Press the Power and Volume Down buttons at the same time

 

Video on how to log on and link my service: